How to solve the Trembling Woods puzzle in Crimson Desert

When you see three turnstile mechanisms and an elaborate mural in the Trembling Woods puzzle in Crimson Desert, it's easy to panic. It's a rather clunky trial and a bit confusing to figure out what you need to do, but once you've got the hang of things, it's actually really simple.

You'll find the Trembling Woods Mysterious Energy just north of the Willow River, southeast of the starting area of Hernand. So how do you solve it? Here's what you've got to do.

Crimson Desert Trembling Woods puzzle solution

Your goal in the Trembling Woods puzzle is twofold: align the mural and line up the rings. To do this, you need to spin three mechanisms, with each one controlling a different layer of the puzzle. The right one moves the background mural, the middle one moves the large ring, and the left dial controls the two medium-sized rings.

The leftmost turnstile has no handles, so you'll need to use the stab attack to jam your sword in it to allow Kliff to push it. Do this by pressing shift and right mouse button (RB and triangle/Y on controller). Note that you need to position yourself so that you're stabbing where the handles used to be—you can't wedge your sword in at any other angle, so it's a little finicky.

As demonstrated in the video above, here's the order you need to interact with the turnstiles to solve the Trembling Woods puzzle:

1. Rotate the turnstile on the right to align the background mural pattern—it forms a large star in the top right, a small moon almost directly at the bottom, and a medium-sized eclipse icon to the left.
2. Turn the middle wheel to move the large ring over the large star symbol in the top right of the mural.
3. Stab the leftmost turnstile and rotate it until the two smaller rings surround the moon and eclipse symbols on the left side.

With the mural and rings properly aligned, the puzzle is complete, and a small door will open in the gap beneath you, where you'll find an Abyss Cresset to get an Abyss Artifact. It's very easy to miss this, so make sure you grab your prize or the puzzle will have been for nothing.